Official SelectionSan Francisco Doc Festival

Indian Men making a Difference

March 26, 2015

Mohamed Hamir, Executive Producer of “Petals in the Dust:The Endangered Indian Girls”

“Women are not only literally the motherhood of our humanity, they are the face of a more humanistic, loving and compassionate world. Therefore killing of our girls, the seeds of our humanity, is the most brutal crime against humanity imaginable.” – Mohamed Hamir

Mohamed is a retired financier who was born and raised in Tanzania. He and his family are of Indian origin. He has traveled widely, and has a keen interest in international affairs. Since his retirement he has taken a particular interest in the causes affecting the plight of children and women. Among his several charitable activities, Mohamed is a member of the Advisory Board of PRATHAM Los Angeles, the largest educational non-profit involved in child education in India and the Executive Producer of the documentary film Petals in the Dust:The Endangered Indian Girls

Excerpt from Mohamed’s speech at the 2015 International Women’s Day Screening of Petals in the Dust: The Endangered Indian Girls

Although I had traveled to India several times on pleasure and business, it was only about eight years ago that I under took a more extensive cultural exploration trip of India to explore my roots. I traveled to large parts of rural India and in the process came to be more aware of the plight of women. On my return I joined and began supporting an organization called PRATHAM, the largest NGO in India, involved in educating the most marginalized and underprivileged children of India.

I came to know Nyna Caputi, Director of Petals in the Dust about 4 years ago through an article I read in a newspaper about the documentary she was working on. I contacted her by phone, and through several conversations, reading her website and my own research was similarly horrified. I learnt that approximately 7000 GIRLS A DAY are killed and eliminated from the Indian society. That is 2.5 million girls every year! Besides being a moral crime, how can a society develop to its full potential when we literally kill the SEEDS OF OUR HUMANITY!! On this International Women’s Day I am reminded of Mustafa Kamal Ataturk, the Founder and leader of modern Turkey, who in his quest to modernize and uplift the Muslim society in general and his country in particular, said in 1923 that if a family has limited resources to educate their children, than they should educate women first because an educated mother is more likely to impart her education to her children than a father would. A similar and popular adage is “you educate a man and you educate a man; but you educate a woman and you educate a nation”

My own upbringing, perspectives and joys in life have been largely influenced by the women of my family: My mother, my sister, my wife, my daughter, my aunts and my granddaughter. They have been an immense source of strength and inspiration to me all my life for their compassion, service to humanity, humility, sacrifices, caring and unconditional love.

– My mother and the fond memories of her compassionate, generous and caring values are a source of ever present inspiration to me to try and do good.
– My siblings consist of two brothers and a sister. And even though she is the youngest of the siblings, my sister has been the foundation of our family and now the matriarch of the family. I thank my parents for educating her. She is the image of my mother in her value systems and our family strength.
– My career success has been due to the strong support, dedication and sacrifices my wife has made in the course of seven corporate transfers and my long absences due to business travels. She sacrificed her own career development to support and encourage my career and to raise our daughter.
– The birth of our one and only daughter was one of the most important and happiest moments of my life. She has given me immense joy and caring.

– Six years ago my wife and I received the most precious gift in the form of a grand daughter through adoption from Calcutta. It was always my wish to have a girl as our first grand child. So when my daughter and her husband decided to adopt they decided to fulfill my desire for a granddaughter. She is indeed a priceless treasure and brings incalculable happiness and emotional fulfillment to us. She is a source of love and affection as a grandfather I had not imagined. We are most fortunate have to her in our family.
It is our earnest wish that this documentary will also inspire building of more orphanages to provide safe harbor for the unwanted girls and children of India and elsewhere.
– And finally Nyna, who embodies my own emotions and sentiments through her work, passion and commitment. She has opened my eyes and touched my heart.

How can I not honor these women? How can I not do something about wiping out one of the most shameful cultural practices of my own Indian heritage? How can I live with this crime against humanity? This is simply a form of cultural terrorism inflicted on society!

And therefore through all my life experiences, I am led to following conclusion and mission:
Girl killing and gender discrimination of any kind, anywhere must end! It is my duty to help stop these practices in every way I can!

February 27, 2014

Sunil Desai – Founder, The Bindi Project

Sunil Desai is the President and founder of The Bindi Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering love and respect for all women and girls in India. Prior to starting The Bindi Project, Sunil served on active duty for more than 20 years in the U.S. Marine Corps, achieving the rank of lieutenant colonel and holding a variety of command, operations, planning, and executive staff positions both in garrison and combat.

Sunil was born and raised in New York City by his American mother and Indian father and is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. He has served as an International Affairs Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a Next Generation Fellow with the American Assembly at Columbia University, and as a delegate to Asia Society’s inaugural Asia 21 Young Leaders Summit.

Website : www.bindiproject.org

What compelled you to start this organization?

Although I was born and raised in the US, I have been keenly aware of my rare Indian heritage since I was very young as there were not nearly as many people of Indian origin living in the US as there are today. However, in visits to family in India while growing up, I never saw or heard about the widespread preference for sons (or any other forms of violence and discrimination that so many women and girls in India face) and the terrible things some people were doing because of their beliefs. When I first found out that many Indians were even killing their own daughters, so many that it was effecting the national ratio of girls to boys, I was appalled and vowed to do something about it. At the time my own daughter, who is only one quarter Indian, was very young but alreadytruly fond of her Indian heritage—her bed room is decorated in an Indian theme by her choice. I felt I owed it to her to try to do something so that when she was older and learned about the situation, she could be proud that at least I was trying to make a difference.

What does your organization do?

The Bindi Project’s mission is to foster love and respect for all women and girls in India primarily by working with men and boys. I believe that most men and boys do love and respect women and girls. But within a population of 1.2 billion people, the small percentage who do not adds up to a large number. I also believe that most of those men and boys who do not love and respect women and girls (and especially those who do not want to have daughters) are committing their crimes out of nothing more than ignorance. Thus, The Bindi Project uses the power of positive example to change how these men and boys think and feel. We have a variety of activities including identifying good men who love and respect their daughters and promoting their stories as positive examples within their own communities and facilitating younger men and boys in taking an active role in preventing violence and discrimination within their communities.

When did you become aware of female infanticide and sex-selection in India?

Despite my visits to India while growing up and as a young adult as well as participation in Indian weddings and visiting Indian friends and family in the US, I did not find out about this problem until I was much older and myself the father of a daughter. I actually read about it in a news article on ‘India’s Missing Girls’ and was in disbelief. I then did more research including talking with family and soon realized the gravity of the situation.

Do you think Indian girls are still endangered? And if yes, why?

Yes. The statistics are quite clear that the situation is steadily getting worse. In 1961 the ratio of girls to boys in India was 961:1000. By 2011, it had fallen to 914:1000. Although this is not yet catastrophic, it is of grave concern and reflects horribly on India. Of course the loss of each life is a moral tragedy, but the sheer scope of the problem is staggering. Other measures of violence and discrimination are similarly getting worse. This despite a huge effort to empower women and girls through education and job opportunities and to protect them through laws and law enforcement.

How do we change the attitude of parents who consider their daughters a burden?

I believe in the power of positive example. It is in human nature to get defensive and fight back when attacked. So telling people they are wrong or bad for what they are doing is not usually effective. However, people naturally want what others have if they see it making them happy or is otherwise in their self-interest. This includes loving and respectful relationships. Therefore changing attitudes can be most effective through positive examples that speak to people’s hearts and minds. Laws cannot accomplish this. For those who are intent on anything that happens to be against the law, the law is simply an obstacle and such people will find a way around the law or simply ignore it if they think they will not be caught. But if people, especially men and boys, see others they know or admire who are happy and proud parents of daughters and do not view their daughters as burdens, they will realize they can have such relationships too.

What can we do to make India a safer place for girls?

Although it is necessary to improve public security infrastructure (public lighting, police patrols, public toilets, health care, and so on), it is more important to engage men directly. Living in a world where one’s safety is dependent upon such structures is unsustainable and unconscionable. We need to engage good men and boys to speak out in their own communities. Though they are indisputably a majority, it is not enough for them to simply go about their lives. By proactively setting the right example and talking about love and respect for women and girls with other men and boys, I believe we can change the mindsets of those who perpetrate or condone violence and discrimination against women and girls.

How can we change the way men perceive women in India?

All human beings naturally do what they believe to be in their self-interest. If men and boys believe that discrimination and violence against women and girls is in their interest, then they will act accordingly. However, if they see that treating women and girls with love and respect is in their self-interests (and, by extension, that violence and discrimination are not in their self-interest), I believe most such men and boys will change how they perceive women and girls.

What are three things you love about India?

The diversity of colors you see everywhere, Indian food and tea, and the pervasive entrepreneurial spirit of ingenuity, determination, and happiness in the face of adversity.

Your favorite quote

Those who would deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves, and, under a just God cannot long retain it. – Abraham Lincoln

January 14, 2014

Rahul Brahmbhatt – Making a difference

Rahul brings an eclectic mix of professional, private-sector experience and personal grassroots program delivery expertise to Magic Bus. Prior to transitioning to the “sport for development field”, Rahul worked in the United States, China, Hong Kong, and India performing a number of roles, including process engineer, project manager, and international sales manager in the energy, oil, and gas industry.

Rahul has conducted research on the role of sports in society, and basketball in India and holds a degree in Sport Management. His not-for-profit work experience in sport for development spans a broad range of areas; from working with the NFL’s Washington Redskins Charitable Foundation, Ashoka, and USA Football in the United States, to personally delivering sport for development programs in Gujarat as an Indicorps Fellow.

Currently, Rahul serves on the Advisory Board for the Centre for Sport Management at George Mason University.

What compelled you to launch Magic Bus USA and what does your organization do?

After working in the engineering and technical fields for 7 years, I decided to completely switch gears and move into the “sport for development space”. In 2009, I decided to move to India for a year and work on a sport for community building project,sponsored by Indicorps. After seeing the transformative power of sport in person (esp when it came to female empowerment), I decided I wanted to stay in this field, and in particular, work with India in some way.

When I learned about Magic Bus, I was amazed that while I had spent a year working on these issues with hundreds of children, they had been working since 1999 and were working with hundreds of thousands of children.

After a few meetings, Matthew Spacie, the Founder of Magic Bus, and I decided that the time was right for Magic Bus USA and the rest is history.

Magic Bus uses community mentors to impart life skills in the areas of gender equality, education, health, and livelihoods to marginalized children and youth – using sport and play as the catalyst for engagement.

Can you talk more about your organization’s focus on empowering girls and work around creating gender equality?

One of the most peculiar things I’ve noticed about female empowerment projects is that they exclude everyone else. At Magic Bus, we realized that to have any enduring change in gender equality, we must involve all stakeholders and it must take place over a long period of time starting at a young age. Teamwork is key to this equation. The default “teams” in society are male and female, and by using sport, we are able to experiment with mixed-gender teams at every level or participation. We have 15 year old girls coaching 10 year old boys…a groundbreaking sight in some communities.

Of our 250,000+ children in the program today, more than 44% are girls, a remarkable figure. Additionally, 98% of adolescent girls in Magic Bus regularly attend secondary school – a testament to the fact that multiple stakeholders believe in girls’ right to education.

When did you become aware of female infanticide and sex-selection in India?

I was aware at a young age, growing up in the USA, but it was just a statistic to me. Through Indicorps, I was able to communicate with young people and really see what the reality looked like 20 years later, when it comes time to attend college, get jobs, and get married.

Do you think Indian girls are still endangered? And if yes, why?

Absolutely. I actually believe things will get worse before they get better. The problem is so deep on so many levels. We send messages of empowerment to girls and their families, but we don’t have similar messages for boys and their parents. Older generations still view things through a narrow lens, and our messages to them are simply “times are changing.”

We will continue to see more and more violence against women in the near future as the “old guard” does more and more to prove their point, that things should remain the way they are.

How do we change the attitude of parents who consider their daughters a burden?

I actually think the parents of girls, for the most part, are already doing quite a lot. If you sit and talk to any of them, they love their daughters and do want the best for them. Unfortunately, we keep asking the parents to take bigger and bigger risks

Some examples:

• We ask parents to educate their girls…but most of the boys in their community, when it comes time to get married, actually view a highly educated girl as a risk.
• When gender based violence takes place, society’s reaction is to create a “safe women’s zone” – which only reinforces that the man has done nothing wrong…

What can we do to make India a safer place for girls?

We need to sell to society as a whole that they will benefit from allowing more opportunities for girls. We need to work together to debunk myths that opportunity is a zero-sum equation and that if you give more choices to women, that men will suffer.

While men get most of the blame for this situation, I think affluent and middle-class women don’t nearly do enough to help their own. It’s a shame that more women don’t treat one another better. You see it within families, you see it with domestic help…you also see it how affluent parents treat their daughters compared to sons.

I think the separation of male and female zones in public spaces is one of the most harmful things, because it reinforces that men and women should not be expected to be able to coexist in a shared space, which is a shame. “Separate but equal” has been proved to be a failed experiment in the USA, and is destined to fail in India as well.

How can we change the way men perceive women in India?

We need to stop approaching the problem so linearly. Assuming that individual men hold the key to the solution limits the other ways in which we can make progress:

Women begin to treat each other with more respect and support the advancement of one another.
Society begins to involve more and more stakeholders in the “gender equality” discussions.
Begin changing the narrative from risk/fear to investment/reward when it comes to investing in a girl or women. Men need to see that having an partner as an equal will make their life better.

All very hard things to do, and will take time.

What are three things you love about India?

The resourcefulness and creativity.The vibrancy and energy.
The sense of community (this one is a double edged sword, but focusing on the positive right now).

Your favorite quote

“Youth is wasted on the young.”
“In the end it’ll be okay…and if it’s not okay, it’s not end.”

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Synopsis

Petals in the Dust: The Endangered Indian Girls examines the condition of an endangered class of people living in one of the most populous, culturally and economic vibrant countries: modern India. They come from all walks of life and share only one common trait: they are female.

A patriarchal mindset, a preference for sons and a deep-seated intolerance has led to the murder of 50 million girls and women in India in the last century. They continue to lose their lives in this century to infanticide, sex-selective abortions, starvation and medical neglect, dowry deaths and brutal gang rapes. The declining female population is also leading to increased crimes against women including trafficking and bride buying. By 2020 there will be 20 percent more men than women.

The film explores the cultural origins of this vast genocidal crime and includes the voices of activists and gender experts. By profiling the unimaginable stories of brave survivors, viewers enter the chilling realities girls and women are currently enduring, NOW, providing a sense of urgency in helping to change status quo.

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